THERE are reasons for believing that the Education department and a succession of senior politicians have, for a considerable time, effectively been pulling the wool over Islanders’ eyes whenever school examination results have been under discussion.

The official line has, for many years, been that the Island’s performance in GCSE exams is nothing short of exemplary. Unfortunately, results broken down school by school – which have been leaked to this newspaper and also secured by a freedom of information request – show that this interpretation of the figures is difficult to accept.

In essence, the data show that although private schools and Hautlieu perform consistently well, results for the four intermediate schools, Les Quennevais, Le Rocquier, Haute Vallée and Grainville, compare very unfavourably with UK standards.

A major benchmark against which performance can be judged is the percentage of students who achieve at least five GCSEs, which must include English and maths, at grades between A* and C. The UK national average is 53.1 per cent. The figures for our intermediate schools are 38.2 for Les Quennevais, 28.4 for Le Rocquier, 19.7 for Haute Vallée and 18.3 for Grainville.

Factors such as the high proportion of Island children in private education, the process of selection for Hautlieu and the vagaries of our catchment areas were always going to skew the distribution of scores. This, however, does not mean that the situation, as revealed by the raw statistics, can be seen as remotely satisfactory. Above all, it does not excuse political and departmental secrecy about the full picture.

The official approach has been to draw a veil over the detail, on the understanding that publication of the facts might demotivate students and staff and unsettle parents. Although there is a degree of pragmatism, not to mention well-intentioned paternalism, in that strategy, it must be seen as counterproductive for the very good reason that problems that are not identified and highlighted are seldom solved. The appropriate course of action must be to seek to understand the objective position as fully as possible and devise methods through which deficiencies can be corrected.

There can be no doubt that the head teachers and staff of the schools facing difficulties are already making serious efforts to improve performance, but these efforts will be hampered if we pretend that nothing is amiss.

There is, of course, likely to be criticism of the JEP for publishing the results breakdown and of the whistleblowing ex-civil servant responsible for pressing home the freedom of information request. It would, however, be more appropriate for anyone genuinely concerned about the quality of Island education to press for change aimed at pushing up standards where there are manifest failings.